One Last Chance
by Hitomi Hotaru
Summary: DH SPOILER! Snape finds himself in limbo and is granted one last chance to make things right with Lily before she dies. However the spirit watching him has finicky rules about messing with the future. Can he follow them and not tell Lily her fate?
1. Besides the fact it was Limbo

Besides the fact it was limbo… it seemed pretty nice.

Severus Snape looked around at his new surroundings and remembered he had died and remembered that the last thing he saw was Lily's eyes looking at him and giving away his memories. As for his surroundings, he appeared to be at Hogwarts. Where exactly he did not know but he was pretty sure it was Hogwarts.

He wandered for a bit, not really hoping to accomplish anything, but he wandered none the less. The limbo school was completely empty. There were no other dead residents to be seen, however there was a resident to be heard.

There were several distinct giggles, which Severus found himself turning on his heels a lot just to find nothing.

"Who's there?!" He yelled after several heel turns, "Show yourself!"

"Who's there? Show yourself!" The voice mocked. It was a girl's voice he could tell that much.

"What do you want with me?" Severus asked and he was desperately getting tired of the game. However to his question only came more of the distinct giggles.

The once professor cradled his head in his hands and the next moment he looked up and there was the apparent form of the rather annoying voice.

It was definitely a she. The voice's body had long blue hair piled on top of her head and was wearing sparkling pink robes. If this was a spirit, it certainly was an extravagant one.

"Will you answer my question?" Snape said annoyed.

"Yes, but first, Do you know where you are?" she replied.

"Limbo."

"What tipped you off?"

"If this were either heaven, hell, or some other afterlife then there would have to be more people."

The spirit smirked, "It doesn't always work like that, but you are correct. Now, do you know _why_ you are in limbo?"

Severus hesitated for a moment, "Unfinished business?"

"No, if that were the case you'd be a ghost, but good guess anyway. Care to guess again?"

"Look," Snape started, "I'm not really into playing whatever game you are playing so just answer my question, 'What do you want with me?'"

She looked disappointed for a moment, "Fine! I am, as you have no doubt guessed, a spirit. It happens to be my turn to run the limbo circuit and might I say it gets _real _boring _real_ fast. That is until you came along. Now you see what happens if you hit limbo after you die is because you have had a pretty miserable life but you did the right thing anyway even though you could have become evil or you were self sacrificing: giving your life or giving up what people thought of you to do the right thing. Now the interesting bit about you is, well, you did both. Now I know what you're thinking, everybody thinks this, if I did good, why didn't I just move on?"

She paused a moment hoping to get some kind of input from her new guest but found that he had none and moved right along, "Anyway! Being in limbo means you get a chance to go back and relive a part of your life you wish to do over."

"You're joking!" Severus exclaimed as an actual smile crept across his face.

"No, I'm not joking. If I were I woulda just said, 'Ha ha! Guess what you're just dreaming! You are actually alive!' Or something like that."

Snape's smile faded fast as his brain began to think over it, "Wait, if the person had a miserable life then why would they want to relive something?"

"Well," the spirit began, "They can move on if the absolutely want to, or the can go back and fix a moment in time or just revisit one happy memory. For instance, I actually met your mother here."

Severus jerked, "My mother?"

"Yes. She got the chance to go back and relive something. She wanted to visit one of the few happiest moments of her life."

"And that was?"

"Watching you around the age of five on a day your father wasn't there to ruin it."

Severus smirked and remembered his mother for a moment.

"Now you," she began again, "Would probably like to go and relive a moment to try and fix it."

"What gave it away?" He said almost sarcastically.

"I had to review your file."

"I have a file?"

"Yeah, anyway! It just holds all your life information: childhood, friends, …lost loves…," She giggled again and the last remark made Severus nervous.

"I am going to allow you to relive most of your years at Hogwarts, and possibly try and fix things with a certain red haired 'friend' of yours. Because," She flipped open a magical file that wasn't there a moment ago, "According to this… your last conversation with Lily did not go so well."

Something swelled up in his chest as he remembered it… "Mudblood…" he said, and then an argument that did not end well, and then never speaking to her again.

"Now, you cannot stop Lily from dying… that was inevitable… but you can make her final memories of you fonder than they are," The spirit concluded, "So, are you willing."

Snape looked up, "Yes…"

--

More to come and yes I promise it will get more interesting as it progresses.


	2. This is no dream

"This will be fun," the spirit giggled once more.

Severus suddenly realized that everything around him was fading. The pink and blue of the spirit was becoming blurred so were the walls of the limbo school. Then it was all black and he felt for a moment as if he were falling.

"Now," he heard the spirit even though he still saw nothing, "I'm going to give you tips on how you can fix your relationship with the once Lily Evans, and some rules."

"Rules? What for?"

"To keep you from permanently damaging the future. For or one thing, you cannot do anything that could seriously change the future. Example: You cannot, whether directly or indirectly, tell Lily that she will be murdered."

Snape swallowed.

"Secondly, you cannot change historical events. Such as, preventing deaths."

Severus was really beginning to hate this spirit.

"And thirdly," though he could not see her, he could tell she was smiling, "You cannot make Lily Evans fall in love with you."

Severus wished he could've seen at that moment for he had a powerful urge to grab the spirit by the lapels of her robes and throttle her.

"Now, for some pointers on how to win back the_ friendship_," she emphasized that one word, "of Lily Evans."

Then in what seemed to be the distance, he could finally see a dim light. It was radiating red and gold. Severus squinted and realized there seemed to be a four poster bed in the middle of that glow. They got closer and closer until they stepped into the light. Upon arriving Snape realized he was in the Gryffindor girl's dormitory for there asleep in the bed lay the eleven year old Lily curled up in her red and gold blanket. Her cheeks were red and raw from crying.

"This is Lily Evans on her first night at Hogwarts," The spirit said.

Severus' head jerked up from looking at Lily, "What? Why would she be crying her first night? I saw her during dinner and she was happy and excited…" He leaned over and brushed aside a strand of hair that had fallen across her face.

"You do of course remember Petunia, or affectionately known as Tuney."

"Yes," he hung his head in shame. He should have known she was missing her sister.

"And you of course remember that the last conversation Lily had with her sister was not a pleasant one."

"Yes."

"Now, do you know what this is?" she lifted a small square brown object from Lily's nightstand.

Snape examined it from where he stood, "No," was his only reply.

The spirit smirked, "Of course. Well, this is a music box. It's a muggle thing. Yes muggle, the side of Lily you never really thought about. Her muggle family, her muggle interests. No, you only wanted to think of her as a witch."

She then wound the music box and it began to play a soft melody. It was one that Severus didn't know the name of, but familiar with none-the-less.

"Do you know the song?"

"No… but I've heard Lily hum the tune before."

The spirit smirked again, "The song is called 'Somewhere over the Rainbow' and it comes from a muggle movie where a normal young girl is sent to a magical place. It was her favorite movie, this was her favorite song, and the music box was given to her before she left by 'Tuney'.

"The reason she cried herself to sleep was while unpacking to go to bed, she found this. She smiled and let it play and then remembered. 'Tuney hates me.'"

Snape's vision blurred again, "She never told me…"

"Never told you what? That she was sad her first night because of missing her sister? That she loves music and will even sing if she is bored? That if she hadn't gone to Hogwarts she probably would have followed in her mother's foot steps to become a singer?"

Severus stared at her. Lily hadn't told her any of that.

"She didn't tell you a lot of things. Mainly because most of the things that interested her were muggle things, and as soon as she got here she learned that Muggles were considered very low. So she decided not to tell you, seeing as you also didn't seem interested in her muggle past."

He couldn't take his eyes off Lily. Suddenly he realized there was so much more he wanted to make up for. Then everything was going dim again till he could no longer see the sleeping form.

"Now, Severus Snape," she began again, "When you wake up you will find yourself in your bed in the Slytherin dorm on your fourth year."

"Fourth year! I can't start from the first year?" He exclaimed.

"No. Reasons being that you didn't start messing up until your fourth year," the spirit replied, "Because if you remember at the end of your third year you became good friends with potential death eaters."

He remembered.

"Now, have a nice nap," the spirit giggled some more.

Severus was comfortable. He could feel the warmth of covers around him. He then thought he should open his eyes. Yes…open his…yawn first… eyes… yes…

As he finally awoke, it took him a moment for his brain to register. A normal day a school, right? No wait… All the memories flooded his mind. Severus leapt out of bed and the warm covers and rushed over to the closest mirror. There he stood in his fourteen year old body. He slowly lifted a hand to his face and began to apply pressure harder and harder until he slapped himself. The pain singed his cheek and a red hand print was left. This was no dream.

"Hey! Snape! Get your lazy tail out of bed! You'll miss breakfast!" came a vaguely familiar voice from the common room.

This was no dream at all…

--

AN: There bit more interesting. Thanks for reading and don't forget to review!


	3. What a marvelous day

Severus dressed as quickly as he possibly could and ran down into the common room. As he stumbled into the room several familiar faces all turned at once to look at him.

"Finally! What did you do? Decide to sleep in on us?" This came from a tall blonde gentleman. It took Snape a moment, but he realized this was Lucius: a young, 5th year Lucius, "Well come on then, some of us need potions homework before lunch."

"Yes, of course," Severus cracked. He then remember two things: one, he did most of those future Death Eater's homework and two, his voice was never kind to him during adolescence.

The experience was dream like almost. He saw faces he recognized yet were still unfamiliar. It was almost like having that deja vu feeling, except instead of it lasting only a moment… it was lasting all day…

Snape entered the Great Hall. His eyes scanned the hall for even the slightest trace of Lily, but to no avail. He was so busy looking for her he didn't even watch where he was going.

**_THUMP!_**

Several mismatched papers all floated down from the sky onto the slightly conscious Severus. He leaned up off the floor to realize that the whole Great Hall was laughing at him, and breakfast may not be the best idea after running into your own house table in front of all your peers.

He rushed out of the hall only to be followed by a blonde haired Slytherin girl who he did not recognize.

"If you're here to continue making fun of me, it's no use," he called out to her.

"Why Severus Snape, I'm surprised you don't recognize me," she said in reply.

He turned around. That voice, it was familiar…

"Who are you?" he dared ask.

The girl's sharp green eyes could in no way compare to Lily's sweet emerald ones. Her short blonde hair bobbed around her face. Her tie was loosened and she held her robe in her arm.

"Do I have to give a hint," she replied. Then she laughed a very distinct giggle.

"You!"

"Yes."

"What are you doing here?"

"I'm here to look after you and to make sure you keep to the rules. I'm also here to give advice if you so wish."

Severus fumed.

"You think you're angry! You didn't even recognize me!"

"Recognize you!? You had _blue_ hair before!" Severus' hormones had resurfaced, "And I don't even know your name!"

"You can call me Lenora," she replied, "And might I say blue is not an acceptable color around here… boring humans…"

"Well… what do you want me to do?" Severus anger was slowly dimming.

"What I want you to do is stay here considering Lily Evans is coming around that corner in 5…4…3…2…"

Sure enough she came. Severus turned to ask Lenora what to say only to find that she was no longer present.

Lily Evans came around the corner with a friend on each side of her and most importantly, she was alive- alive and smiling. Snape could hardly catch his breath.

Lily's auburn hair was flowing around her face. Her smile was enough to knock Snape to the floor, and was it just him or was she _floating_ down the hall.

"Hey, Sev!" she congenially greeted as she passed him.

"Quoth the Evan, nevermore…," Lenora said solemnly. She was back again leaning on Severus' shoulder.

Snape turned and glared at her.

"'Only this, and nothing more.'"

There was an awkward pause between them and Lenora simply did not comprehend what Snape's glare truly meant.

"Are you just going to keep popping in and out like that?" Severus asked while continually glaring.

"Yes, why do you ask?" Lenora responded airily.

Severus sighed, "Oh… no reason….Well now what?!"

"I don't know what did you have in mind?"

What Severus had in mind was not something he really wished to share with his afterlife keeper.

"Tsk, tsk Sevy," Lenora replied.

"GET OUT OF MY HEAD!!" or at least this is what Severus wanted to say, however what really came out was, "GIT out **of** MIE HEad!"

Several Hufflepuff first year girls stared at the pubescent boy as he attempted to fix his throat. Lenora couldn't help but stand back and laugh.

Oh yes… what a marvelous day this was turning out to be…

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A/N: Well yes I'm back! Sorry for the extended wait. School has been rough on me this year and I just haven't been able to post anything.

Anyway as far as the story goes I hope you enjoyed it and noticed the Poe reference. Glad you read it now I hope you review it!

Hotaru


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